California Republican Party

The California Republican Party is the California state affiliate of the Republican Party, founded in 1854. From the American Civil War to 1932, California was a reliably Republican state (from 1899 to 1939, almost all governors were Republican), but Democratic presidential nominee Franklin D. Roosevelt carried all but one county in 1932 and all of them in 1936. From 1952 to 1992 (with the exception of 1964), California returned to being a red state. By 1992, the Democrats were strongest in coastal counties, while the Republicans were strongest in the inland counties. Northern California's inland areas, the Central Valley, and southern California outside Los Angeles County proved to be the CA GOP's strongholds in the state, but the CA GOP suffered catastrophic losses in the 2018 midterm elections, where they lost 7 US House of Representatives seats and were reduced to holding just seven of the state's 53 seats in the US Congress; they also only held 11 of the state's 40 State Senate seats and just 18 of the 80 State Assembly seats. Even Orange County, famous for being a Republican stronghold, was taken over by the Democrats in 2018. In February 2019, the CA GOP underwent a massive change when it decided to attempt to diversify its leadership to expand beyond its older, mostly white voter base; it chose a Hispanic woman, Jennifer Patterson, as Chair, while the Taiwanese immigrant Peter Kuo was chosen as Vice Chairman and the openly gay Greg Gandrud was chosen as Treasurer. The party decided to prioritize local issues over national issues to avoid negative associations with Donald Trump and instead campaign against rising property costs and taxes.